Today I want to share my thoughts on the topic, "Spirituality and Food". Someone may ask, "What has food got to do with Spirituality?". The answer is.... EVERYTHING. How? Well, thats what we will look at in this post.
What is food? Is it just something we eat? Sorry. Its much much more than that. Food is basically everything that we eat, see, hear, smell, touch, read and think.
Just imagine for one moment that you are a horse rider. What kind of a horse would you expect? A horse that is calm, tame and moves as per your instructions or a horse that is wild, untamed and goes wherever it wants without bothering about your instructions? Obviously, the one that is tame. Isn't it?
The mind can be compared to a horse here. Most of us find it difficult to keep the mind under control. Instead of being its master we usually end up being its servant. We do what the mind tells us to do. We run after whatever the mind desires without pausing or thinking whether it is worth running after.
I have experienced it several times in the past and I am sure many of you have too that even though we want to move speedily and smoothly on the path of spirituality, we end up getting stuck somewhere or the other because of the mind. We know it that anger is futile and yet we burn in its unforgiving fire inspite of our distaste for it. We know that lust is never a good idea and yet we fall into its trap every now and then. And what to say about the various fleeting desires and fancies of the mind. We have always been left with a bad taste in the mouth by blindly following them and yet we get lured by them again and again. So what is it that keeps us entrapped in the mind's whirlpool of lust, anger, greed, fear, ego etc even though we want to get away from it? FOOD. Yes its the food that we consume which makes it more and more difficult to get out of the mind's vicious circle. I hope we remember that we are not just discussing food that is eaten. We are talking about anything that the body and mind absorb through the 5 senses.
Let us begin with the grossest form of food. The food that we eat. It has been recommended by the sages of the vedic tradition since yore that alcohol and non-vegetarian food are not a good idea for anyone who is sincerely seeking God realization. Why? Because it is tamasic and rajasic food. Which means the food that increases qualities like laziness, anger, lust, fear etc. The vibration of such food is quite dense and negative. The prana or life force provided to us by such food is of a very poor quality. Other than that, food which is too spicy, too oily, too salty, too hot or even too cold is not a good idea at all.
Now let us explore the other possible forms of food which we absorb everyday. Television surely provides a lot of good stuff. However, most of us choose to absorb sights and sounds of violence, sex, scandal and fear from it. Naturally, we have indigestion because this "food" is not friendly at all. The term "Couch Potato" says it all.
Another dangerous "food outlet" that we constantly expose ourselves to is THE MIGHTY INTERNET. Even though this post will reach you through the internet and internet HAS made life simpler in several ways, many of us choose to welcome the "food" of porn, violence, gossip, chatting without an agenda and playing silly games on the internet. This increases our "indigestion".
Not to forget several other types of "food". The magazines, tabloids and advertisement hoardings that constantly throw lustful, unnecessary and luring images and information in our direction at rocket speed.
And most importantly, the kind of people we hang out with. The kind of friends we choose to associate with makes a HUGE difference in our thinking and lifestyle. We have to choose our company very carefully. We are not talking about being judgmental here. Let us love all and judge none. However, we must remember to keep a safe distance from those who are not spiritual seekers. Most of us start smoking, drinking, watching porn etc because of our friends. Bad company can be like a cancer for a spiritual seeker.
We keep absorbing this everyday repeatedly from morning till night and then we complain that the mind is restless and it doesn't listen to us. Do you blame it? We feed the mind/senses with every possible type of "unhealthy food" continuously for years and then one fine day we suddenly expect the mind/senses to be fully under our control. Trying to walk on the spiritual path and exposing the mind/senses to all kinds of tamasic and rajasic inputs is like applying the accelerator and the brake of a car at the same time. The car won't move an inch. It will just create dust and noise. Let go of the brake. Then the accelerator will work with full force.
Feeding the mind/senses with lesser and lesser tamasic and rajasic inputs will make the journey smoother and faster. The mind will eventually become quieter as it will "run out of gas." The mind can then easily be trained to dwell upon holy images, sounds and thoughts.
Jai Jai Sri Radhe!
Servant of Radha Rani
